So many sermons are boring and there is no reason they have to be; What Sherman said about needing to recover the art of storytelling deserves lots of attention at every seminary. ("Theology is in the story and the story is theology.") Because pastors are responsible for the theology people are absorbing at church, then they better make their sermons less stiff, irrelevant and boring because the congregation will just tune out and won't absorb anything. Sad to say, I fell asleep every time Howard Marshal opened his mouth; I didn't want to, it just happened. He is a gifted scholar, but as fall as I am concerned, he should stick to writing because he wasn't a gifted oral communicator. The Christian message would fall flat if it was always presented like that because you need to captivate an audience unless you have a captive audience. I don't think people need their pastor to put on a show, but being real and speaking from the heart captivates people.
Someone told me that in the Middle East, people think a rabbi is really smart and holy if they can't understand a word they say, and that it is a big compliment if you tell a speaker that they made things too complex for you. But I think the opposite is true; because that is not what Jesus did.

I'm grappling with the issue of heresy. I think it is insidious and needs to be confronted every step of the way, but if we can overlook out of brotherly concern the relgious differences of other faiths, how can we take uncompromising stands with our own people when their conclusions don't jive with tradition / our own interpretations? I mean, can we respect them, and strongly disagree while basically treating them like someone from another religious tradition, or should you be much more strict and confrontational with people from your own religion to safegaurd the faith? I am not sure. My tendency is to be more lenient with an outsider... but I'm not sure that is fair. I guess I expect more from fellow Christians, and get more easily disappointed.